Helping Institutions and Ordinary People Invest Better by Focusing on Risk Control

Search

Subscribe via e-mail

RSS Feeds

Disclaimer

David Merkel is an investment professional, and like every investment professional, he makes mistakes. David encourages you to do your own independent "due diligence" on any idea that he talks about, because he could be wrong. Nothing written here, at RealMoney, Wall Street All-Stars, or anywhere else David may write is an invitation to buy or sell any particular security; at most, David is handing out educated guesses as to what the markets may do. David is fond of saying, "The markets always find a new way to make a fool out of you," and so he encourages caution in investing. Risk control wins the game in the long run, not bold moves. Even the best strategies of the past fail, sometimes spectacularly, when you least expect it. David is not immune to that, so please understand that any past success of his will be probably be followed by failures. Also, though David runs Aleph Investments, LLC, this blog is not a part of that business. This blog exists to educate investors, and give something back. It is not intended as advertisement for Aleph Investments; David is not soliciting business through it. When David, or a client of David's has an interest in a security mentioned, full disclosure will be given, as has been past practice for all that David does on the web. Disclosure is the breakfast of champions. Additionally, David may occasionally write about accounting, actuarial, insurance, and tax topics, but nothing written here, at RealMoney, or anywhere else is meant to be formal "advice" in those areas. Consult a reputable professional in those areas to get personal, tailored advice that meets the specialized needs that David can have no knowledge of.

Fat Fed Profits Do Not Create a Healthy Economy

1) Inflate the size of my balance sheet by 2.5x over last year, all through borrowing at really low rates.

2) Increase my interest spreads by ~50% over last year.

means:

3) I only increased my profits by ~50% over last year??! 🙁 I would have thought that profits would have more than tripled.

Such is life for the Fed. The crisis was a time that led me to write pieces like The Liquidity Monopoly, where the Fed, FDIC, and Treasury played favorites in the economy, and starved the portions of the economy not dominated by large firms, particularly with banks and autos.

My main point is that the Fed should have earned a lot more. Where did it all go? It will be interesting to see a detailed rendering of the Fed’s finances when this is done. Did they realize losses on some of the assets that they bought?

So, when I see the Fed’s seniorage profits up only 50%, I am not impressed. The Fed doesn’t mark to market, so we really don’t know the true performance. Also, remember that seniorage profits are a hidden tax on savers, would earn a higher yield if the government provided less financing.

Part of why we end up in an economic funk is that we finance dud assets at favorable rates, so capital does not get redeployed to better uses. Aside from that, cheap leverage creates a yield frenzy over healthy assets, so that they can become over-levered as well. Examples are numerous:

Investors including PIMCO, are flocking to European corporates, though generally only the stronger countries, not Greece, Italy, Ireland, Portugal or Spain. (Note: PIMCO will exit the trade at a better time than most imitators.)

Finally, I suppose if one pours enough jet fuel on a soggy, rotten log, I suppose one could get it to burn. If the prices of non-GSE mortgage debt are rising rapidly, to me, that means speculation is getting out of hand. Financial leverage is even coming back to these markets. As with junk bonds, the markets are subject to two risks — that the cheap financing disappears, or that the likelihood of defaults becomes more obvious.

To me it is no great achievement that the financial markets are doing well while the real economy is in the tank (Unemployment, Production). That is the nature of what happens when credit is force-fed into an economy, even leaving aside the problems of cronyism. There should be no optimism over the large profits realized by the Fed; it may defray our taxes, but on net, the policies have not helped create a healthier real economy.

Share this:

Related

About David Merkel

David J. Merkel, CFA, FSA, is a leading commentator at the excellent investment website RealMoney.com. Back in 2003, after several years of correspondence, James Cramer invited David to write for the site, and write he does — on equity and bond portfolio management, macroeconomics, derivatives, quantitative strategies, insurance issues, corporate governance, and more. His specialty is looking at the interlinkages in the markets in order to understand individual markets better.
David is also presently a senior investment analyst at Hovde Capital, responsible for analysis and valuation of investment opportunities for the FIP funds, particularly of companies in the insurance industry. He also manages the internal profit sharing and charitable endowment monies of the firm.
Prior to joining Hovde in 2003, Merkel managed corporate bonds for Dwight Asset Management. In 1998, he joined the Mount Washington Investment Group as the Mortgage Bond and Asset Liability manager after working with Provident Mutual, AIG and Pacific Standard Life.
His background as a life actuary has given David a different perspective on investing. How do you earn money without taking undue risk? How do you convey ideas about investing while showing a proper level of uncertainty on the likelihood of success? How do the various markets fit together, telling us us a broader story than any single piece? These are the themes that David will deal with in this blog.
Merkel holds bachelor’s and master’s degrees from Johns Hopkins University. In his spare time, he takes care of his eight children with his wonderful wife Ruth. View all posts by David Merkel →